Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uunet!nuchat!sugar!ficc!peter From: peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth Subject: Re: Forth window system interface Message-ID: Date: 30 Dec 89 16:23:57 GMT References: <8912291429.AA16742@jade.berkeley.edu> Reply-To: peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) Organization: Xenix Support, FICC Lines: 45 > Discussion of the possibility of a portable standard Forth window interface: > > ... progressive layers of windowing functionality described ... > > I really do think you can go a long way with this model without making > > anything that'll break on a Mac or under Gem or Microsoft Windows or X > > or Intuition. > Correct, but by the time you have finished, you have defined yet another > look and feel. Perhaps, perhaps not. It all depends on how much control you let the application have over the interface. If you define the interface in terms of panes (of unknown size) that are tiled together to form a window, then put sufficiently high-level objects in the panes, what's the problem? > In particular, the style of interaction with "gadgets > and buttons" is a major component of look and field, and often affects > the structure of the application. Perhaps. I'd like some more concrete evidence of this... most systems I've seen have pretty much the same semantics for buttons. > I had the skill, insight, time, money, and guts to try it for file > system interfaces ... but I failed on the influence factor ... So the problem is primarily political, then. Not technical. > > ... various "bells and whistles" of different OS file systems enumerated ... > > Ken Thompsom cut through all the file system crap about 20 years ago and > articulated a good set of simplifying assumptions: the Unix file system. Unfortunately there are lots of systems out there that don't allow a UNIX file model. Even MS-DOS, which is heavily influenced by UNIX, has a file system that's divergent enough to cause problems. Oh, and have a look at the Mac csome time... the Mac file system is, to put it kindly, rather baroque. > I can't think of too many commercially successful > applications that still use a curses imaging model. Buyers have come to > expect a lot more. Lotus 1-2-3? MOST IBM-PC programs use text screens with no capabilities that Curses can't provide. -- `-_-' Peter da Silva. +1 713 274 5180. . 'U` Also or . "It was just dumb luck that Unix managed to break through the Stupidity Barrier and become popular in spite of its inherent elegance." -- gavin@krypton.sgi.com